› added 5 years ago

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TIL that two MIT Scientists successfully planted a false memory into a mouse (Mouseception). When set in a certain box, the mouse freezes in terror, recalling that it receives a shock in this box, when this never happened. This research may lead to new treatments for Depression or Alzheimer's, etc.

Read more smithsonianmag.com

via reddit.com

BR1W TIL that in 1921, a man in Detroit went so far as to actually kill himself, apparently in order to then communicate with a chosen spiritualist medium, thus proving that the afterlife was real. It didn’t work.
JyEl TIL that when researchers offered kids broccoli or a chocolate bar, four out of five picked the chocolate but when an Elmo sticker was placed on the broccoli, fifty percent chose the broccoli.
BrBWW TIL that Ashton Kutcher and Scarlett Johansson both have twins.
PYjjL TIL that "the maximum natural lifespan of humans is 38 years"
LQM8Q TIL that the Indian mathematician and astronomer Baudhayana, who lived around 800 BCE, wrote the Baudhayana Sulba Sutra, which describes the construction of various geometric shapes using a rope known as a "sulba” with precise geometric measurements, the Pythagorean theorem, area of a circle.